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The Taken King Oryx

Destiny Lore: The Taken King Oryx (Pre-release speculation)

Character Lore

I wanted to do an early Lore video on Oryx and what we know about Oryx so far and combine this with the knowledge we have seen in the new trailer for the Taken King and also the ViDoc from Bungie.

If you had already read the HoW grimoire card, you could have predicted the return of Oryx. Ghost Fragment: the queen 2 documents 2 figures, one male and one female, coming before the queen, we do not know who they are, but they have no ghost. They mention the war, and I believe they are not in fact referring to the Fallen or Cabal, but the war between the Speaker, The Queen and The Nine. The female figure, which is a hunter goes on to say, “I am here for one battle, and one alone, because it is a battle we must all fight, together or separately. So I will warn the defenders, together or separately. I will do anything—

” her low voice shook with passion— “to end Oryx.” The Queen responds, “so let us end him.”

If I were to guess who those mysterious figures are, I would say the female is Eris Morn or the Exo Stranger. Eris Morn does not have a ghost, she is familiar with the Hive and particularly Crota, however there is dispute whether she is a hunter or warlock so that doesn’t quite match, I have always said she is a Hunter because of the cloak she wears but other people have told me Bungie said she was a warlock, anyway, it would be an excellent way to tie all the DLCs together, Eris Morn teams up with the Queen to take on Oryx, the dark below meets House of Wolves. The other option could be that the female is the Exo Stranger, once again no ghost and her grimoire card actually says she is fighting a long forgotten war. Oryx is referred to the long forgotten king, in the Spawn of Crota Grimoire card. So it could be the Exo Stranger, which would be cool because we don’t know much about her. And the forgotten war that she is fighting could be Oryx taking the other alien races to form his dark army.

So who is the man, well, I really want to believe that the man is Toland, The Shattered or the other option is Osiris. I have seen a lot of people saying that Toland is dead, so let me deviate for one moment. He is assumed dead, Eris Morn’s first fire team included Eriana-3, Vell, Sai, Omar and Toland. Vell definitely dead, he is the Titan we see out the front of the Temple of Crota, Omar 100% dead he was witnessed being tortured as the Hive peel the light from his body, Sai basically does a suicide run at Omnigul and says

“my knives are eager for another dance”.

Eriana-3 mostly dead, she activates radiance and goes off in blaze of glory.

BUT Toland is only assumed dead and his last conversion is with Eris Morn and he talks about learning the Deathsinger’s song, he says

“how then, would she know the song and sing it without dying herself”

he then says “I am terribly curious”, I interpreted this as Toland basically trying to learn the Deathsinger song so that he could use it for immortality. And we don’t know whether he succeeded or failed, so that is why I think he could be alive. Toland is exttremely knowledgeable about Oryx and is seen often talking to Eris Morn about Oryx, for example, The Urn of Sacrifice grmoire card,

“Hive pantheon only begins with Crota, the shattered one said he is but a child among their gods. Even now, I can hear the Hive calling to them, and to Crota’s maker, Oryx.”

The other person, the figure could be, is Osiris. Osiris is the first to talk about the King named Oryx, in the mission Shrine of Oryx. So it could be him. Unfortunately, I have not really looked into the lore surrounding Osiris, so feel free to help out in the comments below. Either way, I hope we learn who has approached the Queen to destroy Oryx because it would be great to learn some more info on all these characters.

Lets look at the new environment. The setting of Saturn is important, as this is part of the old Jovian colonies. And the first thing that comes to mind when thinking of the Jovian colonies is The Nine. Ghost Fragment: Legends 2 grimoire card says

“The Nine are survivors of the cis-Jovian colonies who made a compact with an alien force to ensure their own survival”

. By being close to Saturn we are one step closer to the Nine’s location. But also who did the Nine make a compact with, did they infact make a pact with Oryx? Was Oryx this alien force that the nine made a deal with to ensure their own survival. We know that the Nine are up to something, as they did betrayed the queen and actually set Skolas free, which can be seen in the Mystery Fate of Skolas grimoire card.

On Bungie’s website it says Oryx is “manipulating the Darkness itself” to create his Dark army. Ghost Fragment Legends 2 card also says that “the nine are aspects of the Darkness”. Are the Nine being controlled by Oryx? The new Taken enemies are black, filled with Darkness controlled by Oryx. Either way, I think the Taken King release will allow us to better define and understand the Darkness and hopefully bring us one step close to understanding the Nine.

We cant really talk about Oryx without first discussing Crota. You likely know that Crota conquered the moon with the Hive, and thousands of guardians died. What may not have been clear, was that the taking of the moon was just a shadow of Crota, and his real power existed in his netherworld and once they took the moon, the hive attempted to properly summon Crota to earth to destroy it, that was Omnigul’s job to summon Crota. So in the raid, Crota’s end, when you pass through the white light after the Abyss, you actually enter Crota’s netherworld and destroy him upon his throne. This netherworld concept is told to Eris Morn by Toland.

Crota, son or oryx grimoire card mentions that there could be a string of Netherworlds, and that we have only found Crota’s at this stage and within these Netherworlds lies these ancient Hive

“Whispered lore and fragmentary theories suggest that Crota represents a distinct class of Hive entities, not resident in our material world. My latest synthesis of this scattered esoterica suggests that Crota’s ‘home’ is a universe created or remade by his power and occupied by Hive organisms of immense age.”

So although, we will board the Dreadnaught ship, this idea of another netherworld is quite possible. And you can see some in the trailers a lot of teleportation, which is not typically a hive trait but more of a vex trait, hoards of hive normally emerge from caves rather than teleport in. And the Crota grimoire card also references that the Vex gate system is linked with the Hive Netherworlds and is currently unexplored. So from a lore point of view, the doors are wide open to transport to another Netherworld when we face Oryx, however after seeing the ViDoc by Bungie, they way that they talk about the Dreadnaught, it sounds like Oryx will infact be on the ship,

“they have got prisons, summoning pits, ceremonies.. all those things combined in the giant floating fortress”

So now, I think, oryx will be on the Dreadnaught ship, but I do think the Dreadnaught ship is somehow connected to the Netherworld, maybe it is the hub for all netherworlds, maybe the key to each dimension.

There is not a huge amount of lore surround Oryx at this time. All we know he is basically king of kings, one of the executive produces syas “he is born of darkness” and for some time Oryx was even thought to be fable, stories whispered through the entire system, that is from the Sardock, eye of Oryx card. He is also referred to as the long-forgetten king in the spawn of crota grimoire card. All we know at this stage, is he is not a mere story or legend and has basically been abducted other races and using the darkness to manipulate and change them to form an army. What they have said, is that the Taken enemy will look tormented, more alien and that their will has been broken.

Knowing that the Oryx is going to be difficult, the guardians are given a quest to discover their lost abilities, the Titan’s hammer, the Warlock’s stormcaller and the Hunter’s void bow. It sounds like, the new sub classes, will not unlock straight away but you will have to complete a quest first to unlock them. Which is really cool, reminds me of Avatar the last airbender and mastering all the elements. After that, our Journey starts at a Cabal base on Phobus, were the Cabal are actually trying to escape Oryx but are being captured and our job is to track down Oryx and stop him from creating this Dark Army. One thing is for sure, when we finally track Oryx down, he is going to be tough, according to Toland, Crota was a mere child in comparison to his father Oryx!

Hopefully you have enjoyed the pre-release lore speculation on Oryx and if so please drop a like and leave a comment.

Make sure to drop a like if you are pumped for the Taken King DLC! Join me for some pre-release lore speculation surrounding Oryx. I combine knowledge from Destiny’s grimoire cards, The Taken King trailer and Bungie’s ViDoc for the Taken King to talk about the lore surrounding Oryx. I also briefly mention the new super abilities and how they fit into the storyline.

The Taken King looks to be awesome bringing all the DLCs together, including the Dark Below and The House of Wolves. Hope you enjoy the video and we will see you next time. Make sure to subscribe for more awesome Destiny lore content.